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In addition to the tour we took of Monte Alban, we took a tour that purported to show us artisans at work. This was in reality a thinly disguised shopping tour. ;-) But we knew that when we signed up, so we were neither surprised nor particularly bothered when we were hustled out of our van and given 15 or 30 minutes to "view the artisans" — in other words, get in there and buy. The one exception was a pottery-making demonstration. |
| In the village of Santo Tomás Jalieza, we stopped to see textiles. Women weave using traditional "backstrap looms," which we saw here and in Oaxaca. They nimbly pluck the warp strings and throw the shuttle back and forth, producing intricate patterns while hardly seeming to pay close attention at all. | |
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Rugs for sale in the streets of Oaxaca. |
| Coyotepec is the source of the jet-black pottery that Oaxaca is famous for. (You can see some examples in the photo.) Here we did get a short demonstration from the very amiable Doña Sofia, who is 80 years old and has been making pottery for 75 of those years.
Oddly, the clay is not black; the black color comes from the firing process. The potters don't use traditional wheels. Instead, they use two convex clay dishes set back to back as a kind of proto-wheel. In a few minutes she created a graceful vase out of a lump of clay, making the process look deceptively easy. Doña Sofia starts by throwing the clay and kneading it almost like bread. It occurred to me that doing that daily for 75 years probably contributed a lot to the vitality of her old age. |
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